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Killing each other is one.

While I agree on the "mores" statement, I disagree with the killing one. There are too many examples throughout history, both human and animal that prove that false.

Before Team America showed up, it was a happy place. They had flowery meadows and rainbow skies, and rivers made of chocolate, where the children danced and laughed and played with gumdrop smiles.

Unicorns!

Show me some examples of a single species in the animal kingdom that has committed genocide upon itself?

You can't commit genocide upon yourself - by definition.

What about ants?

"Argentine ants (Linepithema humile) typically form large supercolonies comprising millions of ants and thousands of nests. Within these massive supercolonies fighting is rare, but ants from neighboring supercolonies readily attack each other."

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PG claims above:

"I do not "trade" and never would again. Ever."

But yet you're currently in the midst of a Trading Contest with "Boonie" over on the Yahoo Q's board. Been ongoing for quite a while, and I hear Boonie is murdering you at trading.

Give me a break!

Which is it PhotoGuy? You either trade or you don't. So if you want to come here and ridicule people can you at least tell the truth?

"I do not "trade" and never would again. Ever."

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Must be another semantic difference.

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Full disclosure...I have an awful lot of faz tza and Jan itm calls on both.

That's what I thought. Well I won't put him on ignore, but his credibility is now worth zero.

I do not "trade" I added my weight to bring this pos to its knees. I stated straight up that I had reservations about even being short. I am not now involved with a thing having been stopped out. I keep my word.

this debate of debt being created as interest must,i believe, boil down to human nature and group power created by influence thru politics as this magical clearing in debt thru bankruptcy has been prevented from occuring.

i think debt created by interest could be equivalent to carrying clap or thee aids virus- following thru with your sexual desires would be harmful in an exponential manner,but hey that's human nature and also construed as freedom.

either the national debt is a product of human nature or our leaders are doing what is best for the country.

I have no objection to anyone lending their money out at interest. It's private businesses getting the right to create money where I have an issue with it.

If I have $100, I can lend $100. Why should a bank, and only a bank, be able to lend out $1000 against that $100, and then be able to claim as profit interest on money they don't actually have?

If the problem is the credit growth outstripping productivity growth, then the logical thing to do is to tie the former directly to the latter in some manner. If you let banks do 10-for-1 multiplication of capital by fiat, as long as they lend as much as they can, of course banks are going to be incentivized to do just that, regardless of any productivity benchmark.

PatMcGroin: I don't think that was chocolate in those rivers.

OK Photoguy, I agree with you - to a point. My basic view is that through debt-based exchange, the money changers and usurers will always end up with a disproportionate share of assets and that as industrial profits decline, financial profit-seeking would eventually lead to fraud and looting. My view of this is not that we should do away with debt based money, it is my view that most debt issuance should be a government business to minimize this disparity and the tendency for profit-seeking to end in fraud and looting. This could be accomplished by denying FDIC insurance to any institution that is not set up as a not-for-profit enterprise. Do you have a specific proposal for the replacement of the debt-based monetary system? How might it be instituted without a major disruption of economic activity?

Photoguy wrote..

2. I don't think that you would disagree that we live under a credit based system. Credit is money and money is debt. All money is called into being by debt. Without debt there would be no money at all.

In the present fiat money system, yes, all money is associated with debt, and debt is associated with unpayable interest on the debt.

However, money without debt can exist in the form of coins valued by instrinsic metal content.

Dpwozney wrote..

However, money without debt can exist in the form of coins valued by instrinsic metal content.

Unless your currency is something you can use directly all forms of currency are debt instruments.

You produce goods and perform services in exchange for currency rather than the goods and services you actually want to consume.

The amount of currency you possess is nothing more than a measurement of how much of a surplus you have produced. It is a debt but it's not owed by any specific individual. In fact no one is actually obligated to redeem that debt for you but you accept it as payment because you believe that it will be honored when you want to consume.

Abn0rmal wrote..

Unless your currency is something you can use directly all forms of currency are debt instruments.

A money system is possible in which coins, valued by instrinsic metal content, can be used directly in financial transactions.

A money system is possible but it's still a form of debt even if the coins are valued by metal content.

People invented money to make barter more efficient but fundamentally the economy is still bartering. You produce goods and perform services in exchange for the goods and services produced and performed by other people. Money just makes this more efficient.

When you produce and accept currency as payment you haven't actually been compensated for your production until you purchase goods and services with that currency.

Holding currency means that you have produced more than you have consumed with the expectation that in the future someone will honor this debt and produce a surplus for you to consume.

A "debt free" monetary system is a oxymoron. All forms of currency represent obligations that are owed to someone, which is debt.

Abn0rmal wrote..

A money system is possible but it's still a form of debt even if the coins are valued by metal content. ... All forms of currency represent obligations that are owed to someone, which is debt.

In a money system with paper money that is backed by coins valued by intrinsic metal content, the paper money is associated with debt. Without debt, paper money has no value. All paper money, of value, is associated with debt.

However, any coin that is valued by instrinsic metal content, in that money system, is money without debt.

Dpwozney wrote..

However, any coin that is valued by instrinsic metal content, in that money system, is money without debt.

I'll explain again and maybe this time you'll stop simply repeating the same line.

If you can't directly consume your currency in some form it is a debt instrument. It's simply a signal that you have produced more than you consumed in the past and are therefore entitled to consume more than you produce in the future.

The value of a currency, metallic or paper, is entirely backed by the capacity of the economy to produce the goods and services you want to consume. For example, right now a few ounces of gold are sufficient to fly you to any commercial airport in the world. If an extreme worldwide economic collapse causes commercial air travel to cease then it won't matter how much gold you have - that service is no longer available at any price.

The gold didn't change but all of a sudden some of its value has just evaporated! How can this happen? I thought metals had intrinsic value! Any portion of the value of an item that is dependent on factors external to that item can not be considered intrinsic by definition. So how much intrinsic value do metals actually have? It's somewhat more valuable than a rock and significantly less valuable than an equivalent mass of fertile topsoil (dirt). Metals primarily have speculative value.

When you accept silver coins in exchange for your production you did so because you expect to be able to purchase goods and services with that silver. You've just granted credit because you gave up some of your production without immediately receiving compensation for it. The compensation happens when you spend your currency and buy someone else's production. The currency is a debt instrument.

Isn't it an important difference that precious-metal currency does not have interest payment requirements?

One of the problems we have today is that money can only be created by lending, which means that for every dollar created there is an associated interest payment. The accumulation of interest owed is the pliers squeezing the balls of the economy.

When I see the word "debt" the concept of interest is not far behind, and while I am not the financial genius that some around here are, I can't help but to think that this is not only a material difference, but an essential-nature difference.

Remember that an interest PAYMENT to one person is an interest CASH FLOW to someone else. Always.